Hauntings & Hallucinations
by visionsofmangos
Summary: Sherlock starts hallucinating during a bad acid trip. John takes care of him. Sherlock/John if you squint.


**A/N: Inspired by this pic (t u m b l r. c o m/post/21214601356/oh-my-well-thats-certainly-not-cocaine-then-wtf). Rated for drug use (obviously) and one instance of impolite language. Enjoy!**

Panic overwhelms him. Without thinking, he cries out. "John! John!"

He can't feel his hands. A tingle dances along his left arm that ends somewhere around his wrist. His lips are also disconcertingly numb, and sensation, if not reason, tells him that his skull is expanding. Dark shapes writhe on the walls. Some disentangle themselves to flit around his head, taunting him with haunting whispers in an unfamiliar language. He imagines this must be what hell is like, the devil tormenting him eternally with visions that remain forever just out of his grasp. Is he being punished, he wonders, for a lifetime of sins? But no, he believes in order and reason, provable facts, nothing so fanciful as God or the devil.

And yet… At times like this, the devil seems real enough. After all, Sherlock looks him in the face every morning when he shaves. And if the devil is real, if evil exists, mustn't it have its opposite? So why should God not also exist?

"Auurghh!" Shattering pain explodes near Sherlock's temple, left or right, he can't be sure any longer. He's losing his sense of space. His own body feels as though it's dissolving, leaving behind only his raw, exposed mind. It's terrifying to confront himself this way.

Terror grips him. Across from him, on a chair, reclines Moriarty's ghost. He smirks, and slowly his features morph, melt, and shift until Sherlock is staring at himself. His enemy's voice drifts toward him from somewhere far away, echoing: "Because we're just alike, you and I…"

Sherlock's eyes are rolling back in his head when he registers a touch on his arm, gentle at first and then increasingly desperate, more pressure. It's John's voice this time: "Sherlock? Sherlock! Can you hear me?"

Is this another hallucination? But no, it's John; it is, it has to be, or Sherlock will really and truly lose it, lose himself, this time. Already he fears he is too far gone.

"What did you take?" John demands, and Sherlock gestures vaguely toward the dropper on the table. It's far too much effort, so he allows his hand to flop back into his lap like a dead thing.

Anger and fear lace John's voice; Sherlock can _see _it, even with his eyes closed. The emotions swirl around him in a phantasmagoric display of color and music; his fingers itch to pluck out the notes on violin strings, but he has no idea where his violin is. Meanwhile John's hand is back on his arm, his fingers fluttering anxiously as he checks for Sherlock's pulse and inevitable comes to the conclusion that there is nothing he can do for his friend. Sherlock wonders briefly if he is dead, then dismisses the idea. As he does not espouse belief in the afterlife, there would be no room for the sensory input, however skewed, that he is currently processing.

Suddenly the world falls away beneath him, and Sherlock panics again before he realizes John is carrying him. Sherlock experiences a flash of tenderness toward his flat mate as he perceives John's grunts and muttered curses. How alarming yet enthralling is emotion; how strange it is to feel!

"Don't leave me, you selfish bastard," John pants as he deposits Sherlock on what the latter recognizes as his bed. "LSD? What were you thinking?" He continues to rage, while Sherlock merely squeezes his eyes shut tighter. He wishes he could block out the bewildering visions and the terror-laced fury in John's voice.

One of the dark ghosts hovers closer; the walls are moving; colors swirl together into unrecognizable things, and Sherlock can't help himself; in a moment of weakness he lets loose a yelp and then whimpers. John's rant abruptly cuts off. His fingers lace through Sherlock's. He says nothing, yet Sherlock feels somehow safer. In a few hours, there'll be hell to pay, questions to answer; but for now, all Sherlock can think is that he no longer has to fight the demons on his own.


End file.
